This is the Forward’s coverage of Jewish culture where you’ll learn about the latest (and sometimes earliest) in Jewish art, music (including of course Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen), film, theater, books as well as the secret Jewish history of…
Culture
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The Only Abe Foxman Interview You Need To Read
Watching Abraham Foxman, outgoing national director of the Anti-Defamation League, wipe the tears off his face in front of an audience of about 1,200 people is an experience that one is not likely to witness often, if ever again. But it happened at a recent tribute to Foxman that took place at New York’s Waldorf-Astoria…
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How Omar Sharif Worked For Religious Tolerance
The greatest achievement of Egyptian actor Omar Sharif, who died on July 10 in Cairo, may have been to prove that simple nonchalance may be the best path for mutual tolerance between religions. Acclaimed for screen performances in “Lawrence of Arabia” and “Doctor Zhivago,” Sharif courted controversy by accepting the role of American Jewish gambler…
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For Charles Aaron, It’s All About the Bikes
Charles Aaron grew up in St. Louis Park, Minnesota, the same Minneapolis suburb that spawned Thomas Friedman, Al Franken and the Coen brothers, only Aaron had different ambitions: He wanted to run a professional bike team. His father gave him a Schwinn 10-speed for his bar mitzvah, which Aaron began racing, at first holding his…
The Latest
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Art Nazi Museum Documents Munich’s Ignominious Past — and Puts Hitler in His Place
What would Adolf Hitler say today if he walked by Munich’s recently opened Documentation Center for the History of National Socialism? I posed this question to the German novelist Timur Vermes when we visited the city’s newest and most overdue museum together. Vermes was the perfect person to ask, as he is the author of…
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Harper Lee’s Jewish Lessons
Harper Lee passed away on February 19, at the age of 89. Alexandra Levine remembers the author’s Jewish lessons. “To Kill a Mockingbird” was published in 1960, and this week, 55 years later, the sequel comes out: “Go Set a Watchman.” The title is a biblical reference to Isaiah 21:6 — “For thus hath the…
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Leo Frank Stabbed in Georgia Prison
100 Years Ago Leo Frank, who just began to serve a life sentence in the large prison in Millersville, Georgia, for the murder of Mary Phagan, a girl who worked in the pencil factory he managed, is in critical condition after another inmate tried to slash his throat. In the middle of the night, two-time…
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Dating at 62: A Cautionary Tale
“A tall man with a college education and a full head of hair.” When my friend, an over-60 single woman, decided she was ready to start dating, those were the only three requirements she had for her new man. The guy didn’t need to be attractive or wealthy, just a nice guy with these minimal…
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Film & TV Your Guide to This Year’s Jerusalem Film Festival
Founded in 1984, the Jerusalem Film Festival is a baby compared to its European counterparts Venice (1932), Cannes (1946), and Berlin (1951). Israel’s second-oldest film festival after Haifa (founded a year earlier) and the fourth oldest in the Middle East after Cairo (1976) and Damascus (1979), the JFF has become increasingly robust, exciting and ambitious…
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Film & TV An Exclusive Look at Aviva Kempner’s New Documentary Rosenwald
Aviva Kempner, director of the documentaries “The Life and Times of Hank Greenberg” and “Yoo Hoo, Mrs. Goldberg,” will be releasing her latest film “Rosenwald” on August 14th. The film profiles legendary Jewish philanthropist Julius Rosenwald — onetime president of Sears and a civil rights pioneer — who went on to donate a reported $62 million to charity. The…
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Music The Amy Winehouse We Never Knew
“It’s Amy, your favorite Jewish girl!” Amy Winehouse exclaimed after the beep — she was leaving a voicemail for her friend and former manager, Nick Shymansky. I didn’t even know Amy Winehouse was Jewish. There are lots of things I didn’t know about the late jazz-pop singer. Until I saw “Amy,” the new documentary about…
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The Holocaust Survivor Who Became an Unlikely Korean War Hero
Single Handed: The Inspiring True Story of Tibor “Teddy” Rubin” Holocaust Survivor, Korean War Hero, and Medal of Honor Recipient By Daniel M. Cohen Penguin/Berkley Books, 448 Pages, $27.95 On May 5, 1945, when General George Patton’s 11th Armored Division liberates the Mauthausen concentration camp in Upper Austria, the American soldiers find the bodies of…
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